An Tanshin (1911-1994)

Named Anna Stinchfield Hopkins when she was born
in Cook County, Illinois on February 8, 1911 (birth
certificate #6407), Anne told her husband, Robert, that her
name was later changed (when she was old enough to remember
the event, perhaps six to eight years-old) because
Stinchfield did not provide positive numerology readings.
Her mother, Marian
Stinchfield Hopkins, was born in Detroit, Michigan,
and was 25 when Anne was born. Her father, Lambert Arundel
Hopkins, born in New Mexico, was a 29 year-old "Railroad
Supply Man" when she was born.

Anne spent two years (1929-1931) studying abroad as an
undergraduate at Oxford University and graduated from
Scripps College in Claremont, California (B.A., English,
1932). She then pursued a Master's Degree in Sociology,
first at Stanford University (1933), and later at
Northwestern University (1940-1942). In addition to her
Oxford years, she also lived in England from January to
June, 1937, and at various times in her life traveled to
Sweden, Finland, France, Germany, Spain, Japan, Italy and
much of South America.

She was living at the teacher's quarters of the Honolulu
Diamond Sangha in Palolo, Honolulu, Hawai'i, when she
became ill with flu symptoms and died of a coronary attack
two days later, on June 13th, 1994, with her husband,
step-son, and a few close friends at her hospital bedside.

Anne Aitken died on June 13 of this year [1994] in Honolulu, with her
husband Robert Aitken Roshi , her stepson Tom,
and Don Stoddard, friend and temple builder, by her side. She was 83. Anne
is one of the mothers of modern Zen in the West. She is remembered best for
her generosity with the gifts of life: encouragement, telephone calls,
conversation, books, poetry, music--she liked to play the recorder with
friends--tea and sympathy, tolerance, money, and more encouragement.
Immensely gracious and strong, she helped guide several generations of Zen
students. She had a fruitful and long Zen partnership with her husband,
Aitken Roshi. It began when, on their honeymoon trip to Japan, they stayed
at Ryutakuji and went in to sesshin, without her understanding quite what a
sesshin was. This is a story she told with a relish that reflected both her
delight in absurdity as well as her ultimate pleasure in the dharma. In 1959
she helped found the Koko An Zendo in her living room in Hawaii; it became
the foundation temple of the Diamond
Sangha--now an international association with many
temples.

She studied with some of the great teachers of
her time--Soen
Roshi, Yasutani Roshi, Yamada Koun Roshi--and helped bring them to the West to teach. Her early
studies were in art, literature, and social work, and these influences can
be seen in her later Zen work. In the Maui Zendo she was tough enough to
run the work crews and help a band of undisciplined and unfocused young
people to function and to discover Zen.

Anne inherited money, and it seemed the only
interest she could find in it was to be a benefactor of Buddhism and
social causes. She had a great empathy for the poor, disadvantaged, and
just plain eccentric. She acted as if people would live up to her
standards of service and civility, and mostly they did. She loved people
into being dedicated and even courteous.

Maui Zendo was one of the early temples in the
West where you could do hard training, and without Anne it couldn't have
come to be. In countless sesshins, she inspired us in her particular
fashion. She conveyed her understanding of Zen by her presence, her
floating, dance-like walk, her welcoming words, so consistently dazzling
and intimate that they were like an embrace, her sense that a beautiful
heart and beautiful things and beautiful actions were all on the one
thread, her serenity, humor, and perseverance; these were her teachings.
She deflected flattery and even sincere praise; she saw her gifts as those
of service and loyalty. She was particularly encouraging to senior women,
telling them, "Yes, you can do it, you'll do it very well," when they took
on a new responsibility. The importance of this support cannot be
underestimated. She liked to be in the background herself, but did not
believe that others should be. Her final gift was her candor about the
approaching end. Her image for death was this: We are waiting at a bus
stop - our bus comes along and we get on....;